C'mon baby light my fire

[Straight Shooter]

CHEERS BP !

[Tartar Horde]

Here's a little tip when using the Bowdrill method. The most common method when using a bowdrill is to make a "coal" of glowing tinder and then transfer it to your tinder bundle to "blow" into flame. This works perfectly fine in good weather conditions, but the time it takes to transfer that coal to your bundle can cause problems if the weather is not good. The answer is to rest your fire board on top of a bundle of tinder and as the coal builds up it will be resting directly on the tinder. You need something like a piece of bark etc to rest the tinder on so it doesn't pick up moisture from the ground, then put your fire board on top of that. Your fire board and spindle are very sensitive to moisture and must at all costs be kept dry or you will never make fire. Another tip is to use a lubricant on the end of your spindle that fits into the "bearing" block, this will stop the spindle "chattering" as it rotates. You can use anything from Fat to crushed up nettles, leaves and grass etc as long as they are "green" and have moisture to provide the lubricant.

[Mortblanc]

TH, you can also rub the bearing end of the spindle against your face or inside your ear to lubricate it.

The oils of your face and ear wax are always available and they always work.

[dpack]

im fairly rubbish at "primitive" fire starting but if one has the means to get the first fire going dry tinder is not a problem so long as you dry some and keep it dry.

having a supply of dry tinder and perhaps dry kindling as well is a very good idea.
failing that some work with a knife can produce usable tinders from a variety of things ranging from your clothes to a floorboard or dead tree capable of taking a weak spark or glowing dust up to a flame.

learning to carry fire is another useful technique ,various bracket fungi are ace for holding a glow if they have been dried ,

for choice i would use a "modern" means such as a lighter with a supply of rubber bands wrapped around it but about 30 yrs ago a whole block of magnesium and a spark lighter saved my life in a blizzard with no shelter and a very live tree as the nearest available thing to fuel i had to warm and dry me and my kit and cook the now frozen arctic hare i had "met" earlier in the day.

practice with primitive , modern and unusual means of getting stuff to burn should be a basic as so many things are easier with or depend on fire.safe drinking water seems high on my list of things for which fire is useful.

[NorthernRaider]

I keep all the fluff out of the tumble drier in little tins and add a sprinkle of either Magnesium or Pottasium Permananate, Cheating? probably but it always works

[Skean Dhude]

NR, No such things as cheating. After all prepping for something and putting stuff aside is no different.

[dpack]

indeed there is no such thing as cheating when it comes to lighting a fire.

one of my favourite "cheats" is a candle ,it stores in an easy waterproof form,it will work to take a spark/fluff fire to give a flame and then it will then hold that flame and add a bit of fuel if needs be while you light the fire.

and you can use it to see in dark places should you need to

and there are all the things you can do with wax

perhaps my best "cheat" when making fire is a very sharp blade or a gnarly rough bit of something to make tinder from solids.
many things are quite flammable once scraped into fluff .
cotton clothing and dry resinous softwood are obvious options but many things are quite good if fluffed up fine.
practice with what is around and remember what works.

stuff like cotton wool ,boot polish ,vaseline ,lip balm etc etc are good to know about but if new resources such as those are unlikely to be available various dry mosses or shrooms and animal fat might be good combos to practice with until you find a mix that works and is likely to be available atshtf.

imho when king alfred burned the cakes he wasnt cooking dinner he was drying tinder ,hence the bracket fungi called king alfred's cakes
going by the one glowing gently in my hand at the mo once they are glowing they hold fire rather well.

[Ogri the trog]

Mention was made at the very beginning of this thread about Maya Dust and its questionable availability in the UK as a naturally available tinder source.

It certainly is available, though not overly common in my experience. The fallen or cut stumps of conifers "can" contain fatwood if a number of conditions are right. Finding a suitable stump may or may not result in you getting a reasonable haul, though once you find "some" you will have the experience of knowing where to look to find more - you can take it home and store it or rely on using it fresh - up to you!

My advice, however, is in carrying Maya dust.

It used to be sold in metal tins but now comes in plastic tin-shaped containers. Nothing wrong with the container, but if the shavings within are then carried in your pocket for anything more than a few days, heat from your body will drive off the volatile organic compounds that would otherwise catch a spark or flame and lead to it burning brightly.

If you carry Maya Sticks, they still contain the same VOC's but they are not so easily driven off by body heat, owing to it being in a significantly larger lump - and a little scraping, feathersticking or fine carving will produce a usable pile of dust at the time you want to make fire.

Furthermore, if you cut a Maya stick in half, drill a hole in one end and attach it to a key ring with a hank of jute cord that you have smeared in wax. A ferrocium rod and striker would be the only other items needed to be the start of numerous fires.

ATB

Ogri the trog

[harrypalmer]

Good post Ogri, I've tried Maya dust but to be honest prefer the humble cotton wool/Vaseline or King Alfred cake. I'm moving to New Zealand by the end of 2017 and will be outdoors a lot more than I am here in the UK...I'll give Maya another go.

[sethorly]

Me and the kids have graduated from vaseline-soaked lint as our tinder, to scraped birch bark. (We're using ferro rods, but ultimately would like to move on to bow drills.) Birch bark, if available, is often available in huge quantities so it also makes great kindling. Whilst I agree that "artificial" tinder (eg. vaseline/lint) is a valid and great way to start a fire, ultimately as a prepper I want to prepare myself with the skills to make fire using naturally-occuring materials.